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Work in progress. KEY *Inaccurate History or Mythology *Accurate History *Semi-Accurate History *Literal Events Pre-History *Chryseum falls from the heavens; burying herself in the earth to rest from her long journey, she warms the planet and brings about all forms of life. *Aeons and Ancients were always on the planet as part of the Lifestream. They consider it to be their family, brothers and sisters. c. 8000 BCE *As is true with most societies, the people don't always get along. One of the Aeons, Aswan, wanted to take the place of King (gender neutral term). She used her power-set to animate the corpses of the dead Aeons and Ancients to form an army. Aswan is the sister of Deleo, goddess of reanimation and "life" where Deleo is one of current life and thus, "death." The war that ensued made the King realize that there would have to be a buffer world between the Lifestream rich Promised Land and possible threats. They split the worlds, creating the main realm that humans live on and banishing Aswan and her followers there. Slowly she starved herself into a deep sleep, biding her time. c. 2000 BCE *Aswan awakens as Her Children start to develop the ability to harness the Lifestream, weakened by her lengthy slumber. Using the lifestream, she attempts to possess the strongest magic user that she could find, thus creating the Thaumaturge. *The Origin was a young woman who was a general in a mighty army, unable to hold the full force of the powers, he goes mad. One of his soldiers takes up the role of the first Champion by hunting him down and destroying him before he could harm anyone else. Along the way to kill the Thaumaturge, this soldier falls into the company of an agent of the child-goddess Deleo, customarily referred to as the Army of Monsters, chosen to help bring about the natural end of the world. *The Champion and the Monster form a band of heroes and journey to take down the Origin. Upon the Origin's death, the powers slip back to the earth. However, Chryseum had already touched humanity, and her influence would remain to concentrate over time, waiting for another child worthy to become Thaumaturge to be born. *Lignum is born as an experiment based off Aswan. She is everything to everyone for the majority of her life; her parents raise her to be a super soldier, while another doctor thinks that she holds the cure to all illnesses. They all believe they have succeeded in creating an Ancient. *At this time, material taken from Aswan is seen as a cure-all for many ailments. As a result, patients are prescribed the material for a wide range of illnesses at a wider range of concentrations. This eventually leads to the medication being used as a street drug known as "Swan," primarily administered via injection. The drug works, but higher concentrations bring up serious side effects: Users suffer delusions, erratic behavior and bursts of what can only be described as megalomania. Some patients and users are outright driven insane. Lignum, with a higher concentration of Aswan than anyone else on the planet, eventually falls victim to this insanity as well, albeit much later in life than would be expected from anyone else. *Following an early altercation with Lignum, Praelium Calligo is exposed to an extremely high concentration of Aswan, infecting him in much the same way Lignum had been—however, while Praelium fights with delusions for a time, he eventually overcomes the infection inside him and is able to use the abilities granted by it to track Lignum. In this way, he locates and defeated Lignum in a climactic battle that lives on in legends for millennia. *The so-called "Army of Monsters" from those legends is actually a man named Clades Avium, who became an experiment from the same labs that made Lignum; he's discovered by Praelium on his journey to find and kill the once-great general. Because of the way his body had been changed and manipulated by the scientists, he is "selected" by Deleo to become the aeon designed to bring about the end of the world. *Once Lignum is killed, Aswan seems to go into remission. Praelium's group all fear the obvious truth, that she's just rebuilding her strength to try again; Since the vast majority of the population has been exposed to Aswan in one way or another, there are very few left without some level of infection, from children to people in power. Over time this infection concentrates in the bloodlines of humans, preparing for a time when Aswan can take control again. *From this point forward history and myth records that the vast majority of Thaumaturges are female, leading to the name "Daughters of Chryseum." Male Thaumaturges, regardless of how much of the full force of the powers they're granted, tend to be mentally unstable and are often killed as children before they can go mad. Those that survive to adulthood don't turn out well. c. 1900-700 BCE *Somewhere in this timespan, a research facility is established on the moon. At some point the facility begins to focus on monster research, primarily in relation to whether or not monsters are actually the spawn of dead infected Ancients; experiments are carried out off-world in order to limit the chances of any infection spreading from the project, or contaminating the project, as the moon is "clean." Clades disapproves. The current administration doesn't care. *When war breaks out on the planet, the researchers are forced to abandon the facility or risk being left to die on the moon. In order to make sure their studies don't ever fall into enemy hands, a self-destruct sequence is initiated. Just prior to leaving, one researcher releases the locks on the monsters' observation chambers and allows them to flee the facility just prior to the explosion. Clades REALLY disapproves. The current administration still doesn't care. c. 800 BCE *The second Thaumaturge receives the powers. Legend says she was so hurt by the wickedness of humankind that she called down the first Lunar Cry and, with the help of her Champion and the Army of Monsters, forced humanity to all but start over with a very limited population. *Eventually, the fires of war lead to a young woman with a particularly noteworthy concentration of infection coming into powers similar to Lignum's. She kickstarts a plague to eradicate her nation's foes, and Clades takes on the task of killing her before she can destroy all of humanity. With her dying breath, she wills the powers (the infection) to transfer to her two daughters. This splits the concentration of the infection in two, limiting both the amount of power a Thaumaturge can utilize and seriously lowering the risk of insanity. Both daughters work to end the war and salvage what's left of humankind. c. 300 BCE *Thaumaturge Schala summons the first Lunar Cry, the call of her powers pulling monsters down from the moon in a horde. The impact is so great that it all but destroys the southern continent, melting the ice at the southern pole of the planet. This begins "the Cataclysm." c. 1-20 CE *The two current Thaumaturges, from Esthar where their advanced technology has been protecting them from the effects of the Cataclysm, join together to end it once and for all. The two of them forcibly shift the continents, break up the clouds and bring the sun back to the rest of the world. They draw freshwater out of the ocean to restore the currents and seed lakes and rivers throughout the other continents. At the end, they both will their powers to another two young women and pass away. c. 700 CE *Thaumaturge Garnet rises to power, overthrows the monarchy with the assistance of her Champion and creates the first human democracy since the destruction of the lunar base. She goes against the other Thaumaturge, Xefon. Because he was born without a Champion, he attempted to steal one many times. Eventually, during the final moments, Garnet's Champion agrees to see Xefon off and he disappears from history. Xefon is chosen by Deleo as an agent. Clades disapproves. Deleo literally could not care less. c. 1100 CE *Thaumaturge "Kefka" happens. It doesn't end well. c. 1900 CE *Esthar develops a mobile research center with the intention of manufacturing a Thaumaturge, or at least mimicking the Powers in someone not "chosen" by Chryseum or the current Thaumaturge. Aeons are summoned and implanted into human hosts, and Clades is captured and researched for a time. While he is eventually freed (thanks in no small part to Bellum, the information gleaned allows the leading researcher, Professor Andris Rigo, to succeed in his endeavor and transform himself into an artificial Thaumaturge. To the surprise of the current Destroyers, rather than acting out with his newfound abilities, he all but destroys the research center and disappears. The hope, for the moment, is that the power drove him mad and he died with the other researchers. The mobile research center has been seen drifting in international waters on multiple occasions, but any attempt to approach results in electrical disturbances powerful enough to damage any approaching vehicle. Category:References